Whether Irving has bent of falsified or misrepresented evidence

13.127 I am not persuaded that the criticism of Irving for the way in which he presented the statistical evidence of Dr Sperling is justified. I accept the explanation given by Irving why he chose to rely on his higher figure, namely that the estimate which he gave unofficially in a letter was the most reliable one. In the light of Irving's assertion that he had seen evidence which established that Mehnert had informed Kleiner that his estimate of the number of deaths was 40,000, I am not prepared to accept the Defendants contention that this was an invention on Irving's part. The other criticisms of Irving under this head have already been addressed in the earlier paragraphs of this section of the judgment.